Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Appropriate or relevant.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Placed near to; specifically, in botany, lying side by side, in contact, or partly united.
  • Suitable; fit; appropriate; applicable; well adapted: followed by to: as, this argument is very apposite to the case; “ready and apposite answers,” Bacon, Hen. VII., p. 120.
  • . Apt; ready in speech or answer: said of persons.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Very applicable; well adapted; suitable or fit; relevant; pat; -- followed by to.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Appropriate, relevant, well-suited; fit.
  • adjective Positioned at rest in respect to another, be it side-to-side, front-to-front, back-to-back, or even three-dimensionally: in apposition.
  • adjective Related, homologous.
  • noun rare Something that is apposite

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective being of striking appropriateness and pertinence

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin appositus, past participle of appōnere, to put near : ad-, ad- + pōnere, to put; see apo- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin appositus, past participle of adponere, from ad- + ponere ("to put, place").

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Examples

Comments

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  • apposite: appropiate.

    apósito: venda.

    January 10, 2008

  • An apposite opposite of opposite.

    August 26, 2008

  • I impressed my wife -- hard to do -- by dropping this word appropriately (appositely?) into conversation. Thanks, Wordies!

    October 26, 2008

  • Kangaroo word: APposiTe

    June 12, 2009

  • I love this word.

    December 29, 2009

  • Charles John Smith, in his book Synonyms Discriminated, makes a useful distinction between apposite and relevant:

    "Apposite expresses a quality, relevant a force. A remark is apposite which harmonizes with the case under consideration. An observation is relevant which helps the main question to a decision. . . . The apposite elucidates, the relevant promotes discussion. The apposite is a proposition; the relevant either an argument, or something which links itself to an argument. Apposite remarks are commonly made in general conversation by persons not taking a main part in the discussion, but throwing in pertinent sayings as listeners. The relevant owes its force solely to its argumentative appropriateness; the apposite is also timely, and often tells with peculiar effect upon the conjuncture at which it is introduced.

    April 19, 2011